EDITORIAL: Lamar Smith poor choice to chair House Science Committee

Here's a question for New York Republican Party officials: How will you continue to convince New York voters to send your relatively moderate GOP candidates to Congress, when their presence there maintains the control of a national delegation that, in some things, insists on governing from outside the bounds of reason?

Case in point was the recent selection by the House GOP caucus of Rep. Lamar Smith, of Texas, to chair the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology.

Smith, you see, is a global warming skeptic who has criticized the media for allegedly failing to report "dissenting opinions" about climate change.

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That's right -- the members of the House majority see nothing wrong in putting in charge of the Committee on Science someone who doesn't believe the science behind the most serious issue facing us in the 21st century.

Smith says he believes the climate is changing; he just doesn't happen to believe that humans have anything to do with it.

This has become the fallback position of climate change naysayers as evidence of climate change has mounted. And it puts Smith squarely opposed to the most important science he will oversee.

Let's be clear about this: The debate over human contribution to the rapidly warming globe is over. There is a scientific consensus that global warming is indeed happening and human activities are playing a role in it.

To cite just a few examples:

o The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency states that "Earth's climate is changing" and "(m)ost of the warming of the past half century has been caused by human emissions of greenhouse gases."

o The Union of Concerned Scientists, which has aggregated the supporting statements of scientific organizations, states "there is now an overwhelming scientific consensus that global warming is indeed happening and humans are contributing to it."

o A 2009 survey of more than 3,000 responding Earth scientists concluded "the debate on the authenticity of global warming and the role played by human activity is largely nonexistent among those who understand the nuances and scientific basis of long-term climate processes."

Putting a climate change skeptic in charge of the Committee on Science, Space and Technology is something like putting a Christian Scientist in charge of the nation's immunization program.

If you basically don't believe in science, what business do you have overseeing science policy?

And if moderate Republican congressmen help make it possible for the likes of Smith to be elevated to responsible posts, can New York voters continue to elect them in good conscience?